


Gold Without The Glitter

by topcatnikki



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Depression, Grand Prix Final Banquet, Heavy Angst, M/M, Post-Banquet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 18:59:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13173165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/topcatnikki/pseuds/topcatnikki
Summary: The show must go on…Sometimes-Sometimes he wishes it didn’t.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A collection of ficlets I'm uploading from my tumblr that were written for Sachi and Nyxee

All of the praise in the world is worth nothing in the end. Praise is just an arrangement of saccharine words, used as a means to an end. 

 

He knows. 

 

_ He know it.  _

 

Yet he keeps going back for more. 

 

Those glittering calculating eyes that measure him up, challenging and demanding, wishing and wanting. They reflect light like the lenses of the paparazzi cameras that focus on him wherever he may wander. They reflect light like the glittering stones embedded carefully into each and every costume he dons for a performance, a faux skin to be shed after only a few minutes of glaring brightness. 

 

His skins are kept in cases and boxes.

 

His past lives gathering dust. 

 

He wishes he could peel away his own mask so easily; could undo the years of careful masquerading and simply unfurl into the world as a nameless, faceless person. 

 

If he could, if it were possible, what would he do? Where would he go? 

 

He entertains the ideas sometimes, in stolen moments of solitude. He dreams of jetting around the world as an unknown entity, dropping into the very corners of existence and experiencing life through his own eyes. 

 

He can't. 

 

_ He can't.  _

 

There has always been a detached part of him, there has always been a third person behind his eyes. 

 

He is Victor Nikiforov. Russia’s living legend, a national hero, an olympian. He's the five time gold medallist. He's the darling of the figure skating elite. He's everything the papers have ever said about him. 

 

He's also the one behind the mask, the boy trapped behind the athletes accolades. He never got to climb trees and be dirty, he never got to be a hormonal teenager. He never got to have silly breakups and makeups with a boyfriend. 

 

He can't. 

 

_ He can't.  _

 

Too much risk to his name. Too much risk to his career, his reputation. Victor Nikiforov is worth his weight in medals and printer ink. 

 

Victor Nikiforov is worth nothing unless he is delivering to the masses. 

 

Victor Nikiforov is worthless without those glittering insecticide eyes measuring him. 

 

Victor Nikiforov is worthless without the weight of his skates tying him to the ice, the slick sounds to keep him grounded. 

 

Victor Nikiforov is worthless without the multitudes of adoring fans and praises raining down upon him.

 

For without all that, who is Victor Nikiforov?

 

The boy with a dog in the pages of a magazine? The slickly decorated apartment in a coffee table book? The images printed for the world to consume? 

 

Without those things Victor Nikiforov is worthless. 

 

He feels it though. 

 

During the off-season and during his rest days, carefully hidden away from prying eyes. 

 

He feels. 

 

He feels… 

 

Nothing. 

 

He's an empty vessel waiting to assume a persona. He's an unpainted canvas waiting for those first brush strokes. He's a shadow cast by the light of the moon, crowned in silver and barely there. 

 

He's empty until he forcibly fills his void of a self with the sparkle that will bring their attention back to him. He's nothing until he is something worthy of their attention. 

 

Even when he gets it, it doesn't help. The attention. The praise. It's so fleeting and so <baseless> that it rebounds back from him. 

 

It didn't use to be that way. When he was younger. When he was brighter, maybe? When he was fresh, and new, and unknown he used to absorb the words like they were gospel, like they were a saving grace- like sweet nectar. 

 

Now he knows.

 

_ He knows.  _

 

Not nectar- not that. Those empty praises were poison, were cruelly addictive poison that crept into the empty spaces in his heart and took root. They were a drug so heady and so potent he was hooked before he could possibly have known it.

 

Not he was an addict without the surety of a fix. He was an addict being told over and over again that this was the last time. His last shot. His last season. 

 

Time was not his friend. 

 

Sometimes-

 

Sometimes when he's feeling petty and self destructive, when he’s feeling angry at himself and the world, he drinks more than Yakov would approve. He drinks and gets messy, alone in his stupidly perfect apartment and he play  _ The Show Must Go On  _  on a loop and laughs bitterly at the irony. He laughs at the perfection of it. Then he cries at the idiocy of it.

 

He pours bitter tears into the fur of his only friend.

 

Makkachin bears it all very well, astute and solid and real.

 

The mornings after those particular sessions are the worst. They’re the worst because like the masochist he is he keeps the song on a loop. He uses it as an armour and as a mask as much as any of the others he’s ever donned. He listens to the strains and the arching overbearing heavy noise and lets it pound into him.

 

It’s a punishment as much as anything else.

 

He tried to explain it, once. 

 

He tried to encompass it in words and put it out into the world, but Georgi and Chris had been dizzy with wine and winning and had laughed at the drama of it all. Of course the most decorated figure skater in history was sad, of course it wasn’t enough. They had laughed. 

 

Victor had laughed too.

 

It was easier to play it off as a bad joke brought on by good wine and introspection, than to try and actually argue his case. It was easier to hide it behind his smile.

 

He listens to more Queen on the days he feels rubbed raw. 

 

He listens and wishes he could know the things they knew, wishes he could feel the things Freddy sings for him. 

 

_ Love _ .

 

Freddy pours beautiful words of love into his empty heart and he aches for it. Freddy sings songs about reaching for unknown feelings, striving for the faceless persons, throwing himself into something substantial and true and real. Freddy knows about love. Victor doesn’t.

 

Victor only knows that the show must go on. He knows it and the feeling settles over his skin like constricting bands as he takes place upon the ice to reach for the unknown. Reach for someone- anyone in the world who could possibly pull him from himself. 

 

_ Stammi vicino, non te ne andare. _

 

He pours himself out onto the ice, bloodied and bleeding from the wounds he knows he’s inflicted upon himself.  _ He did this to himself _ . He lines out his sorrow in ice and cold perfection. He paints a picture of perfect solitude with his body and soul, and then he leaves. He leaves the the sad, broken, lonely man out on the ice and faces the press. He smiles for the camera and throws out soundbites like he’s a politician. 

 

_ The show must go on _ …

 

Sometimes-

 

Sometimes he wishes it didn’t.


	2. Chapter 2

There are  _ Moments _ in life that are gilded and impossibly bright,  _ Moments _ that draw the eye of those around them for the sheer weight and momentousness of them.  _ Moments _ that change the world around you in seconds with the barest of fleeting touches.

 

Victor has seen them in passing, been on the outskirts of them frequently. When he’d won his first gold, that had been a  _ Moment _ , when the weight of his victory had settled around his neck - He hadn’t known then that it was a noose rather than a coronation...  

 

He hadn’t known then that the gilding he’d received was a ton weight pulling him further and further from himself.

 

The eyes that have followed him for years were a target on his back and a burden on his shoulders, but he stood tall under the scrutiny as always. Camera ready smile and a wink. Always...

 

Always someone watching him as he made his way through the world, always an audience. Always something to play to and to play for.

 

He’s tired and beyond caring. He’s worn smooth by the regard. He’s clutching a glass of room temperature Champagne and making small talk and aiming smiles at faceless suits.

 

Moment to moment, golden days and double pages in glossy magazines - he’s been worn out by it all.

 

Victor thought he’d had  _ Moments _ in his life, but he was wrong.

 

He was wrong because  _ this  _ was a  _ Moment _ .

 

Not being buried in medals and media attention, not being showered with praise.

 

His  _ Moment _ was being led around a stuffy banquet room by a thoroughly ruffled and incredibly intoxicated figure skater.

 

He’d been on the outskirts, out of the limelight, drawn in by the sudden change of the room and spotted by his fellow competitor. Challenged by Katsuki to show him what  _ he _ was made of after the man had dealt a blow to Yuri’s ego by beating him in a dance off. Katsuki was laughing wildly and freely, the magnum of Champagne left forgotten as Victor joined him.

 

It was… 

 

It  _ was _ .

 

Victor so often feels like a man becalmed, stuck in one place and stranded in his own mind. He’s alone so often that the sudden shift in the winds around him startles him into action. 

 

Katsuki isn’t just the wind, he’s a gale, he’s a tornado. He’s a force of nature that’s sweeping Victor up and pulling him along in his wake. His regard has weight behind it, his voice is a purr, his body is sure and steady as it leads Victor through dance after dance without pause.

 

Victor lets go, surrenders himself to Katsuki.

 

He’s breathless with laughter and flushed in the face, he’s watching Katsuki as he laughs in return and spins them. Their fingers clasped and faces close. He can’t feel the weight of the eyes that follow, because this, right now, this is their  _ Moment. _

 

Katsuki abandons him… 

 

He heads off with a dashing smile and loosened tie to dance with Christophe Giacometti, but only after extracting promises and devotions from Victor. 

 

_ “Be my coach, Victor!” _

 

He can’t think of anything to reply, but the blush that dances across the bridge of his nose and remains throughout the duration of Yuuri’s poledance should be answer enough, right? 

 

.

 

Later when the wines have worn off and Katsuki is leaning heavily against his shoulder, he asks again.

 

_ “Be my coach, Victor?” _

 

It’s a whisper against the lapel of his jacket.

 

It’s something  _ new _ .

 

It’s a  _ Moment _ balanced in the scales.

 

Victor holds his breath for a second, wondering if and how he should go about abandoning his career. If he  _ could. _

 

He imagines the media reactions, the thousands of fans bereft- he imagines Yakov, yelling because of course he’d be yelling.

 

He can’t find it in him to be anything other than excited at the prospect of getting to know Yuuri.

 

.

 

Hotel hallways have always unnerved Victor. 

 

Something about the repetitive nature of their design, or the never ending way they seem to go on forever.

 

When he was younger he used to have nightmares about them, about getting lost in beige walled passageways with miles to walk between locked doors he could never get through. He used to wake up clammy and shaken.

 

Today they don’t.

 

Tonight they don’t.

 

Tonight Yuuri is leading him by the hand, chatting away at him as they go. He’s not even sure if this is the right floor. Yuuri is telling him about onsens and the rules for bathing. He’s telling him about sneaking off to his home rink- not Detroit, but a tiny place in Hausetsu where he feels like he’s home. Yuuri asks him about St Petersburg and life with the world at his feet. 

 

They’re lost in the maze of endless hallways now, sat with their backs to the beige walls and legs stretched out before them.

 

Victor talks.

 

He puts words around the feelings he’s never spoken- not since Georgi and Chris had laughed at him years earlier- and Yuuri listens.

 

Yuuri watches him with wide eyes and frowns at him when he tells him of lonely nights and lonelier days. Of the passion he once had burning out so, so long ago and the smoking embers he feels still there and still warming him, but not in the way he needs to keep going. He tells Yuuri all of this, and Yuuri reaches out to him with steady hands and steady voice.

 

_ “You’re not lost, Victor, you’re not alone, and you’re not lifeless.” _

 

Their fingers tangle, Yuuri squeezes his hand.

 

_ “Lost things can be found again, and passion can be rediscovered. You just need to  _ look _.” _

 

Yuuri doesn’t address his wet eyes, and doesn’t negate his feelings. 

 

He offers him hope.

 

.

 

Victor doesn’t see Yuuri again.

 

Doesn’t hear from him.

 

Victor skates, Victor smiles, Victor wins.

 

Russian nationals come and go, and Victor doesn’t hear a thing when he puts in another gilded performance. 

 

He stands on the apex of the podium looking down at the camera lenses pointed at him, grinning until his cheeks hurt, hoping that somehow Yuuri will see him- really, really see him through the lenses of those clinical cameras. He  _ hopes _ .

 

.

 

Victor doesn’t see Yuuri again, and it leaves a bitter taste in his mouth.

 

He dreams of endless hallways again. 

 

But it’s different,  _ these _ hallways echo with the laughter of sixteen glasses of Champagne and whispered secrets.

 

.

 

Victor doesn’t want to skate Worlds.

 

.

 

Victor wants to stay in bed and maybe take Makkachin for a walk.

 

.

 

Victor doesn’t want to hear the opening bars to that hideous Aria. 

 

.

 

He doesn’t want to think about  _ Moments _ .

 

.

 

He doesn’t want to think about the way his chest had constricted and his heart had lurched when Yuuri Katsuki had clutched onto him. He doesn’t want to think about the seed that had been planted when Yuuri had hung off him drunkenly telling him about Onsens and Coaching. He doesn’t want to think about how sure Yuuri had been that not all things were lost forever.

 

It was a  _ lie _ .

 

It was a lie because the dreams were back and worse now than ever, now that that he had some clue what he was looking  _ for. _ It was a lie because the found thing had held him tight in a hotel hallway and told him there was hope was gone- removed from him without a second glance. It was a lie because he was more lost and more lonely now than he had been before he’d found Yuuri.

 

Yuuri Katsuki.

 

A man with heart and soul on his sleeve in a way that was so visceral that Victor had spent hours watching every one of his programs and been breath-taken at the beauty and the emotion on display.

 

Yuuri Katsuki.

 

A hurricane who had swept him along in his wake and plopped him down. Isolated and Lost again.

 

Yuuri Katsuki.

 

.

 

Yuri Katsuki is not at Worlds.

 

Yuuri Katsuki has apparently quit Figure Skating.

 

.

 

Victor wins.

 

.

 

St Petersburg is just how he left it. Cold and Grey.

 

.

 

Makkachin is kind when he cries, Makkachin is warm at night when he’s curled around her. Makkachin’s fur is soft against his face as he buries his woes into her curls. He tries and fails not to wonder where Yuuri is right now, if he’d blasted in and out of Victor’s life on a whim and left him lost, or if he’s just as lost as Victor feels.

 

Yuuri has quit skating, has no use for a coach anymore if he’s giving up- so young and with such promise- he doesn’t think that, it’s not for him to judge. It’s not for him to decide Yuuri’s life, Yuuri’s career. So instead he pours his bitterness into the dark of the night, where no-one can hear him break apart over and over.

 

Makkachin deserves better than being some replacement for a shadow in his heart, and he hates himself for even thinking about the man with the brown eyes and the roguish smile.

 

.

 

_ Stammi Vicino, non te ne andare. _

 

.

 

Victor tries to pick up the pieces. 

 

It’s not easy in the off season for him to find things to busy himself with, but he  _ tries _ .

 

He walks Makka, spends time at the rink blocking out the bare bones of programs that play on the edges of his creative mind, just out of sight.

 

There’s something about Love that’s stuck in the corner of his mind, clinging to the edges of his consciousness like too many glasses of Champagne and dancing with a beautiful man-

 

He pushes the thought away.

 

.

 

He dreams of an endless hallway, beige walls stretching on into infinity.

 

He walks, feet sure and heart thumping.

 

There’s the sound of laughter and revelry calling him onward.

 

He emerges into the bright twinkling lights of a banquet room, the giddy sounds of laughter are overriding the whispered protests of the officials and disapproving stares- because there in the centre of it all is Yuuri, bright and beautiful and leading Victor around the dancefloor with sure steps and heated glances.

 

Victor lets himself be led.

 

Victor lets himself be drawn in.

 

Victor watches himself fall.

 

.

 

Eros is born of a _ Moment _ . 

 

Eros is pulled from him in a dream and laid out in the slick sound of his skates over the ice. It’s the feel of Yuuri’s fingers over his as they moved together, of the way his hips had undulated under Victor’s hands. It’s the feel of fingers in his hair and challenging glances over a magnum of champagne.

 

Eros is the bitter taste of being left behind, lost and alone.

 

.

 

Agape is different.

 

Agape  _ hurts _ .

 

.

**Author's Note:**

> As always you can find me on Tumblr as [@topcatnikki](https://topcatnikki.tumblr.com/)


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